Lidya Tarhan

Assistant Professor of Geology and Geophysics

Lidya Tarhan is Assistant Professor of Geology and Geophysics at Yale University. Her research uses the sedimentary record to reconstruct the co-evolution of ancient life and environments during critical intervals of Earth’s history. She also investigates the processes responsible for fossilization and how fossilization biases modify geologic archives. Her research approach combines field-based sedimentological and paleoecological investigations with a petrographic-, geochemical- and modeling-based toolkit. Her recent work has centered on resolving the nature, timing and factors responsible for the radiation of multicellular life, as well as the emergence of early animals as ecosystem engineers. In addition to her geologic investigations, she also studies the environmental factors controlling animal-sediment interactions in modern marine settings. Prior to starting her faculty position, she was a Postdoctoral Associate and NSF Earth Sciences Postdoctoral Fellow at Yale. Professor Tarhan holds a Ph.D. and M.S. in Geological Sciences from the University of California, Riverside and a B.A. in Geology and English from Amherst College.